Holly trying to hibernate

Just wondering if anyone may be able to shed some light on this little situation I have.

Every morning I wake up go down stairs and turn Holly's light on. I then look for her. She is always under her hut, buried, or under the light, again buried in the bark.

This morning I came down and there was no disturbed bark so had a quick rummage anyway. Not in her bark!!!

Over in the corner of her table, the soil was disturbed!! Moved the soil around a bit, couldn't see her!!!! My heart was pounding at this time! Well in the end I had to dig DEEP and there she was, right at the bottom of her table, about 1.5" under the surface.

I wasn't sure what to do with her so I moved the mud from around her and picked her up and put her back on the surface.

Not sure if I was really supposed to disturb her but I was afraid she might of been trying to hibernate???

I'm not hibernating her this winter as basically, I'm to scared!!!

Would she of been ok if I left her. As she don't usually wake up till about 10-11am, would she of been able to breath while under that soil and would she of been able to get back out easily??

Silly questions I know, but sometimes theses silly question aren't in any books that I have!

Hi, regarding the oxygen whilst buried there is no problem at all. Our torts can do this for really long periods of time even buried under a foot of soil. When they are resting like that they need very little oxygen and basically they know what they are doing!

To prevent our torts hibernating we do need to provide really quite a lot of light as well as heat. Even then they slow down in Autumn becaus they can sense what is hapening outside in the real world and their body clock is telling them its a resting time.

Hi Katie,
Oz is right about the light levels, when Hettie was with the vet his thoughts were that when overwintering we should aim to give them as much light as during summer to trick their body clocks.
He suggested 16 hours which was far more than I have read elsewhere. So we have compromised, Hettie gets 14 hours and the difference in her activity levels is amazing.
Her lights come on at 6am she is awake when I get up at 6.30, with her little nose poking out. Her heat comes on at 7am for 12 hours. By 7.45 she is in full basking glory!! A bath before I go to work and she has already made her way to her food dish before I leave for work at 8.15!! Although quieter later she is still awake on my return and starts to settle about 6.30pm. Heat off at 7pm and lights out at 8pm.
Blimey... Military precision or what, poor Hettie, it must be like living with the Von Trapps!!x( (Sound of music)

It's amazing how they can breath under ground. Victor buried himself a lot in the summer, I think because the temperatures were low. Someone lost their tortoise for a few months last year and pulled up a nasturtium plant and out popped the tortoise, good as new.